


It's Not the End, I'll See Your Face Again

by springdreaming



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cancer, Doctor/Patient, Fake Marriage, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 00:42:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5949571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/springdreaming/pseuds/springdreaming
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Imagine this,” he says to Lavellan, who he passes at the nurse’s station. “A man who’s still young being diagnosed with terminal cancer, but he can’t get the tumor removed because he doesn’t have the money. Imagine his boyfriend refusing to marry him, because he knows that he’s only after the insurance.”</p>
<p>She laughs. “Well, you might as well marry him instead, then.”</p>
<p>Hey, that's an idea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Not the End, I'll See Your Face Again

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, I want to say that this game ruined my life. Secondly, I would probably ship Cullen with anyone, but this ship happens to be my favorite. This is my first work for the fandom, and I had a ton of fun writing it. Also, I love Dorian more than life itself. 
> 
> It should be noted that this work has content that may be sensitive to cancer survivors. Please be aware of that before reading.
> 
> Title taken from lyrics to the song _Walking In The Wind_ by One Direction.

There is probably a point in your life when you realize that ultimately, not everything is going to turn out the way you expect it to.

Cullen trudges to the nurse’s station, exhausted and his bad day already thoroughly ruined. He’s running fifteen minutes late to his next consultation, and there’s a stack of charts eight inches thick tucked under his arm that need his signature on them.

He’s not even halfway done with his shift yet, but he already feels his hands twitching with the need to break something. Which, for a man who makes his living taking care of people and being around others and helping them, isn’t very good. At all.

Belatedly, he hears someone calling his name, and turns around to see Josephine hurrying toward him, hair disheveled, her shoulders heaving as she struggles to catch her breath.

“Cullen, I’m glad I caught you,” she pants as she skids to a halt in front of him. “I have an emergency surgery to be in right now, could you please check up on this patient and discharge him for me? We can’t keep him for another night, and this might take a while.”

“You’re in so much of a rush that you can’t sign the papers, but you can tell me to do it for you?” he asks as he takes the chart out of her hands.

His tone is clipped, but she sees through the sarcasm and smiles at him, a genuine one that makes him forget to be irritated with her. “It’s a little complicated, but it’s all in the chart. Thanks, see you later!”

She turns on her heel and leaves as quickly as she came, off around the corner before he can blink. In the scenario that he _isn’t_ running late and two of his patients _didn’t_ die on the operating table this morning, he might be more okay with this, but right now, he’s just a little upset.

He heads over to room 530, frowning as he flips through the chart. This patient is scheduled for discharge today?

“Good afternoon, Mr. Pavus,” he says when he walks into the room. “I’m Dr. Rutherford, and I’ll be handling your discharge papers today.”

He looks up at the young man sitting on the edge of the bed, smartly dressed in tailored pants and a button-down shirt, with an outrageous-looking mustache that curls up at the corners. There’s a small suitcase sitting on the bed beside him, hospital clothes impeccably folded and sitting on a nearby chair.

“A pleasure, Doctor Rutherford,” he replies, taking the hand that Cullen extends to him and shaking it. His fingers are cold. “Call me Dorian, if you’d like.”

“Dorian,” Cullen repeats. “May I ask why you’re being discharged today?”

The other man raises his eyebrows. “I was told that I could leave today, so I’m leaving.”

“You do realize that--”

“That I have a massive tumor pressing against my adrenal gland?” Dorian smiles ruefully at him, his mouth quirking up at the corners. “Trust me, Doctor, I’m more than aware.”

Cullen wants to ask if he’s aware that he’ll die in a few months without seeking treatment, but thinks perhaps the question would be too brash. “If you don’t have it removed, it could seriously damage your health--”

“I know,” Dorian cuts him off with a bit more force this time. His tone is light -- one part something close to arrogance, the other an almost startling resignation. “Doctor Montilyet made sure to alert me of the, ah -- bleakness, shall we say, of my current situation.”

“Then why,” Cullen starts, but another look from Dorian is enough to silence him. He hesitates for a moment longer before pressing his pen to the clipboard and signing.

“I don’t have health insurance, if you must know,” Dorian says a moment later, voice stiff. Cullen looks up at him in surprise. “I can’t afford the surgery.”

“Oh.” Cullen swallows. He flips to the next page to find a sticky note from Josephine -- _Give him some free samples of our meds? Thanks._

“I proposed to my boyfriend, you know,” Dorian says flippantly. “Last week. We’d only been seeing each other for a few months, but _he_ has health insurance, at least.” He shrugs. “I suppose he saw through me."

Cullen looks at him incredulously -- after all, who on earth would propose to someone just for the insurance? But then he looks at him, and thinks that perhaps for this man, it might have been the most rational choice. Who can say what a person should or shouldn’t do, when their life is on the line?

“How long have you had the tumor, Dorian?” he asks, breaking the silence.

“A few years now. Or so they tell me.”

Cullen nods, and manages a tight smile as he passes over the clipboard. “Here are some papers for you to sign. Give me a minute and I’ll pick up some meds for you, alright?”

Dorian nods, and Cullen turns to leave the room. Once in the hallway, he lets out a breath he’d hardly realized he’d been holding.

He hates it when this happens -- when people have every chance to live and be saved, but they can’t be, because they don’t have the money. It’s something he’s always contemplated -- why should money alone determine whether you live or die?

Everyone should have the right to live, he thinks. Despite everything, he loves his job, and would still be here even without the salary he makes as a surgeon. This is the only thing he hates -- being unable to help when he knows that he can.

“Imagine this,” he says to Lavellan, who he passes at the nurse’s station. “A man who’s still young being diagnosed with terminal cancer, but he can’t get the tumor removed because he doesn’t have the money. Imagine his boyfriend refusing to marry him, because he knows that he’s only after the insurance.”

She looks up from the chart she’s scribbling on, her lips twisting into a smile. “Does that make you sad?” she asks him.

That’s the difference between the two of them, he thinks. Lavellan has learned to become impersonal about her job -- Cullen is almost jealous.

“Well, yes -- oh, don’t act so above it all. He still has his whole life ahead of him.”

She laughs. “Well, you might as well marry him instead, then.” She closes the chart, slides it back into place, and walks off, leaving him alone with his thoughts and the crowded flow of the hallway stretching around him.

Hey, that’s an idea.

-

Dorian stares back at him, one hand braced against his suitcase, the other hovering in midair a few inches away from the doorknob. “Excuse me?”

“I have the insurance that you don’t,” Cullen repeats himself, and can practically feel the tips of his ears turning what he knows must be a blooming shade of red. “I could save you.”

“I’m really quite flattered, Dr. Rutherford, but I can’t accept that offer.”

“Why not?” he demands. “You have nothing to lose. In a few months when you finally keel over, you’re going to wonder why you didn’t take me up on this.”

“There are too many reasons,” Dorian shoots back. “This really is a terrible idea--”

“It’s not an issue of sexual preference, surely,” Cullen says bluntly.

Dorian scoffs, but seems to have no further retort as he releases his hold on the suitcase and sits down on the edge of the bed, carding a hand through the close-cropped hair at the back of his neck.

“Why are you doing this?” he asks at last.

Cullen looks at him, and there’s something tugging at the underside of his heart that seems to be attached to the way Dorian’s eyes turn down at the corners, hoping against hope even as he ducks his head and tries to hide it.

He smiles. “Good question. So, what do you say?”

The smile he gets in return is a small one, but it’s there. “Do you have a ring for me, at least?”

Cullen feels his back pocket. “I have a spare key to my apartment. Will that do?”

Dorian laughs a little. “I’ll take it.”

-

He finds Josephine sitting in her office, swiveling idly in her chair with a bowl of cup noodles clutched in her hands. She looks up when the door clicks shut behind him, a noodle hanging out of her mouth.

“Can you take my shift tomorrow?” he asks her, dropping a pile of charts onto her desk. “I’m busy.”

“I suppose…” she replies cautiously, lifting the edge of one of them with a finger and peering at it with a doubtful expression. “No surgeries?”

“Just an appendectomy. Nothing too complicated.” He smiles gratefully at her. “Thank you.”

“Can I ask what you’re doing?”

“Me?” For some inane reason, he can’t stop himself from grinning. “I’m getting married.”

“Oh, alright then.” She blinks. “Wait, what?”

“I’m getting married!” He pulls the door open, backing out of the room as her expression changes from incomprehension to one of disbelief. “Wish me luck!”

“Wait -- wait, Cullen, where are you going? You’re getting _married?!”_

-

It’s really not as exciting as all of that. They’re getting a few papers signed, but that’s the gist of it, and as soon as the new insurance takes effect, Dorian will be going straight back to the hospital, to be operated on by Cullen himself.

“I’d hardly trust anyone else to the arduous task of cutting me open and rearranging my internal organs, mind you,” Dorian tells him as he finishes signing the papers, sliding them across the table to Cullen. “After all, if you can’t trust your spouse, who _can_ you trust?”

Cullen laughs, barely skimming through the page before signing on the dotted line with a flourish. He feels lighter, buoyant somehow, as though he’s floating on air -- it’s easier than he anticipated, signing himself away, to be attached to someone else through the most legally binding of contracts, and he feels like laughing now because he can.

“It’s a pretty basic procedure, actually,” Cullen says while they wait for the clerk to return with the statements that will declare them approved for a marriage license. “I doubt that there will be much, er, rearranging.”

Dorian shrugs. “Still. I’ll feel better knowing that I’ll be safe in your capable hands, Doctor.”

The list of things that Cullen knows about Dorian is a short one, but the other man’s confidence is something he couldn’t have missed if he tried. It seems to radiate from every fiber of his being -- even the way he’s sitting now is all relaxed composure, from his long, sprawling legs and the graceful way he holds himself to the look in his eyes whenever he says something bold or outlandish, as if daring Cullen to push back.

Cullen clears his throat, embarrassed. “Yes, well. You should probably call me Cullen now, given the circumstances.”

“Fair enough.” Dorian shifts in his chair, crossing one leg over the other. “So, exactly how long after the surgery do you plan on the two of us keeping this thing up?”

“Hard to say,” Cullen says. “Long enough that no one thinks to accuse us of insurance fraud, for one thing. It shouldn’t be too much of an issue, as long as you have it in you to pretend not to hate me for a while longer.”

Dorian smiles at him. “Well, I can’t imagine that should be too difficult.”

Cullen smiles back. “Thank you.”

As long as he can tack a few more decades onto the end of Dorian’s life, he’s glad to be doing this with him. He’s not expecting anything to happen between the two of them -- no, of course he isn’t -- but a few years from now, maybe Dorian will be someone he’ll be happier for knowing.

“So, do you think that receptionist over there is attractive?” Dorian asks him, leaning back in his chair.

“We’re _married,_ Dorian,” Cullen says, feeling just a little wounded.

“We also just met. Let’s make a few compromises.” He tries again. “Do you find that receptionist over there attractive?”

“What does it matter who I find attractive? Besides, what do you care? That receptionist is a woman.”

“Oh, come now. I’m trying to ascertain whether or not I’m your type; the least you could do is help me along with it.”

Cullen isn’t sure if Dorian is genuinely asking or if he’s only teasing him, but he glances over his shoulder anyway, following Dorian’s line of sight to a young woman in her mid twenties standing a few yards away.

“She’s pretty, I suppose,” he says with a candid shrug. “Not really my type, though.”

When he looks back at Dorian, there’s something in the other man’s eyes he can’t quite place. It’s several long seconds before he speaks, a slow grin spreading across his lips.

“No,” he replies. “Rather, not mine, either.”

Cullen laughs again, more loudly this time, and feels, if possible, even lighter.

-

“You can’t be serious!” Josephine exclaims loudly, craning her head one way and then the other to be sure that no one’s looking their way. “You married a _patient_ so he could use your insurance? Have you lost your mind?”

“I’m a doctor, Josephine,” he reminds her with a grin. “I save lives.”

“Which we typically do _without_ marrying the patient!” The look on her face now is one of abject terror, and Cullen braces himself for the lecture he knows is coming. “I can’t believe -- and you could both get in so much trouble for this -- you _know_ that we’re not allowed to date our patients!”

“I’m not dating him,” Cullen clarifies, “I’m married to him.”

“That’s ten times worse! That’s it, give me his charts. He’s mine now -- you’re not allowed to operate on him. I absolutely forbid it.”

“What? No! He’s mine now, both inside of this hospital and out.”

“You’re married to him! You don’t have the right to cut him open anymore!”

For a moment he thinks she’s going to do something rash, like hit him or go to the head of their department and report him for malpractice -- but then she sighs and all of the fight goes out of her shoulders, and she affixes him with a worried sort of expression that makes him feel almost guilty.

“Cullen,” she says hesitantly, “is there something going on that I should know about? Is everything alright?”

“What? Of course,” he replies immediately, but the look in her eyes after he says the words makes him think that he may have said them too quickly. “Look, this isn’t about me. I have the chance to save someone’s life, of course I’m going to take it. This isn’t just someone else we should let fall through the cracks -- this is something I can control.”

“Always playing the hero,” she mutters, but doesn’t protest. “Promise me you’ll be careful.”

“Of course.”

“And I get to help with the surgery. He is technically still my patient, after all.”

He smiles at her, relieved. “Deal,” he says. “I wouldn’t be able to do it without you, anyway.”

-

 When Dorian opens the door to see him standing there, he looks surprised. “Oh, it’s you.”

“I brought dinner.” He holds up the take-out containers with one hand -- there’s a bottle of red wine in the other.

“I won’t say no to that. I haven’t eaten all day.” Dorian opens the door a little wider, steps aside to let him through. “Come in.”

“The surgery’s scheduled for next Thursday, to be done by yours truly,” he tells Dorian as he follows him into the kitchen, where he goes about grabbing wine glasses and cutlery out of the cabinets. “I trust you’re alright with having it removed as soon as possible?”

“I had thought about keeping it for a bit longer, but decided against it. Must have been my semi-irrational fear of dying, or something of the sort. So, what’s for dinner?”

“Chinese. From the place on 11th and Sunset.” Cullen takes a seat at the kitchen table, watching Dorian spoon the contents of the boxes onto plates. “Dr. Montilyet will be helping me, if you don’t mind.”

“No, I don’t.” He crosses the room, sets a plate down in front of Cullen and slides into the seat across from him with his own. The room goes silent as he reaches for the bottle of wine and pours himself a glass, all the while watching Cullen as he looks around the kitchen.

“Something on your mind, Doctor?”

“Cullen,” he corrects absently, shaking his head as though to clear it. “No, it’s nothing.”

Dorian shrugs. “If there’s something you’d like to say, feel free to.” He swirls the wine in his glass a few times before taking a measured sip. “I’m at my leisure.”

“It’s just--” Cullen starts, and then stops for a moment, deliberating. “Well, you don’t seem like someone who…that is, you don’t--”

“I don’t seem like the type of man who would have let himself die of cancer due to a lack of health insurance, you mean,” Dorian finishes for him.

“Well, no,” Cullen replies, scratching the back of his neck in embarrassment. “This is a nice place. You’re well-dressed, sure of yourself where a poor man would not be. I know what it is to live in poverty -- when I was young, my parents were always worrying about my siblings and I. It’s a look I’ve not seen on you.”

Dorian laughs at that, and Cullen looks up, startled. “No, I don’t suppose you would,” he says. “I used to be a professor of law at the university, before I was laid off a few months ago. I loved it -- still do. It’s probably one of the only things I’ve ever been good at, teaching. Just talking, really, for hours and with no one to interrupt me. There were cuts from every major department at the beginning of the year, though. I wasn’t the only one.”

He falls silent and Cullen stares at him, at a loss for words. A sudden rush of sympathy for Dorian floods through him -- he can’t imagine what it would be like to lose something so central to who you are, but he imagines that it would be devastating.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and means it.

Dorian waves him off. “What’s done is done. I’d started searching for another job, but then I learned about the tumor, and, well, you can imagine. I suppose if and when I do start back up again, I’ll have you to thank for it.”

Cullen swallows around the growing lump in his throat. It doesn’t seem to matter how long he’s been a doctor; gratitude always feels foreign somehow.

On impulse, he reaches for his own wine glass, curling his fingers around it and raising it into the air between them. “To life, then,” he says.

Dorian grins, lifts his own glass to clink against it. “To life.”

-

He’s not really expecting to see him again -- at least, not before the surgery -- but three days later, just before noon, he gets a knock on the door to his office, which turns out to be Josephine telling him that he has a visitor.

Dorian is waiting for him out in the hallway, looking more casual than Cullen has ever seen him in a grey knit sweater and jeans, his hands tucked into his back pockets as he stands there watching the doctors and nurses and patients go by. “Oh, there you are,” he says when he spots him.

Cullen blinks. “What are you doing here?”

“I was in the neighborhood,” he shrugs. “I was wondering if it might be possible for me to buy you lunch.”

They end up eating in the hospital’s cafeteria, at a secluded table near the back of the room. It’s loud and crowded as always, and Cullen sits across from Dorian, watching him stare dubiously at his ham sandwich and french fries as a toddler screams loudly from somewhere behind them.

“I had another appointment with Dr. Montilyet today,” Dorian tells him while he eats. “She called me a few days ago and told me to come back in for a consultation. I presume that you told her about us?”

Cullen grimaces. “She didn’t say anything about it, did she?”

Dorian shakes his head. “Not at all. She did keep muttering things like _‘honestly, what was he thinking’_ under her breath from time to time, which I did find rather odd, but other than that, she was perfectly professional.”

“I don’t think she’s very happy with me,” Cullen says honestly.

“I think I’d much prefer that she be unhappy, so long as I remain alive,” Dorian replies.

“Are you nervous?” Cullen asks him. “For the surgery, that is.”

“Hardly.” For a moment, he looks almost as if he wants to say something more, but seems to decide against it. “Ready to have done with this, that’s all.”

Cullen suspects that deep down, Dorian is a guarded sort of person -- he can be flashy, and certainly witty, prone to extravagant gestures and dramatic outbursts, but Cullen has the distinct impression that there are certain aspects of himself that few people know. Which is a shame, he thinks, because there’s so much he still doesn’t know about Dorian, even if he is technically his husband.

So far, the two of them have only ever spoken of inconsequential things, favorite books and wines and where Cullen should go if he’s ever in the mood for a really good Italian restaurant. And now they’re sitting across from one another in a crowded cafeteria, and for the first time, Cullen wants to know more.

“Let’s talk about something happier, then,” he says, changing the subject. “I imagine that your family will be quite relieved when they hear the news of your impending survival.”

Dorian snorts. “I can’t imagine that they would. We, ah, don’t speak often.”

“What?” Cullen frowns. “Why not?”

“We had something of a falling out several years ago.” He says the words as though they’re the most natural thing in the world. If he notices the shock written on Cullen’s face, he says nothing about it. “Come to think of it, I haven’t seen them since.”

“But why?”

Dorian looks back at him, with a smile that looks almost forced. “I don’t think you would want to know,” he says, and leaves it at that.

“Oh.” Cullen looks away, taken aback. “Alright, then.”

-

Dorian is already prepped and lying on the table, sound asleep, and Cullen looks over his shoulder at him from his spot at the sinks, where he’s washing his hands with Josephine. Just a few minutes left to wait now, and then they’ll get started.

“Do you have rings?” Josephine asks, not bothering to look up as she busily scrubs under her fingernails. “Or _anything_ to prove that you’re married, other than the documents?”

“He has a spare key to my apartment,” Cullen informs her, “and I have a spare key to his.”

She glances up at him with a withered expression. “You’re impossible.”

“No, I think the word you’re looking for is compassionate, but good try.”

“You have a key to _my_ apartment,” she reminds him, exasperated. “Does that mean that you and I are married as well?”

“That’s only because you never asked me to return it after you got back from your vacation to Spain,” he protests. She shoots him a look before turning off the tap and drying her hands on a paper towel. “You still don’t have a key to mine.”

Josephine only shakes her head, muttering something inaudible to herself as she walks into the operating area. Cullen quickly follows suit.

Later, when they’re busy removing the tumor, he thinks that if it wasn’t for the cancer, Dorian would have a particularly nice adrenal gland. He’s never thought about it before now, but he likes guys with nice adrenal glands.

-

Come to think of it, this _was_ Lavellan’s idea. If anyone should be blamed, it should be her.

“I didn’t -- what -- you actually married him?” she sputters when Josephine tells her, watching with an expression that’s somewhere between intrigue and disbelief as Cullen stares fondly at the door to Dorian’s hospital room.

“Well, it was a good idea, wasn’t it?” he asks distractedly.

In hindsight, Lavellan’s sarcasm has certainly gotten her into some trouble on more than one occasion, but she _is_ well on her way to becoming head of their entire department, which is why Cullen didn’t hesitate to take her advice. He turns back around to face the two of them, smiling in spite of himself.

Lavellan buries her face in her hands, looking faintly ill. “I wasn’t _serious_ , you idiot.”

Cullen frowns, indignant. “I saved his life!”

“So, you actually like him, then?” Josephine asks, propping her arm up against Lavellan’s shoulder.

“What? No, of course not,” he says defensively, feeling slightly flustered. “I’m just happy to have helped him. It isn’t like that between us, in any case. Who knows, we may even end up divorcing soon.”

Both of them are looking at him as though he’s gone mad, and he supposes that maybe he has. He’s a surgeon, so it would hardly be the first time.

“You might want to go and check on your husband, then,” Josephine says acidly, while Lavellan shudders at the word. “He should be waking up any time now.”

“Right. I should go and see how he’s holding up,” Cullen agrees, nearly tripping over himself getting up out of his chair. He waves goodbye to the two of them and heads off toward Dorian’s room, medical chart in hand.

And -- oh, alright, for a post-op patient, he looks really good.

He closes the door as quietly as he can, puts his chart down on the end of the bed and sits down in a nearby chair, watching him. He’s still sleeping -- mouth hanging slightly open, hair a bit tousled with sleep, and Cullen feels his mouth go dry. He doesn’t know if it’s because he’s his husband now, or maybe if it’s because he personally saved his life, but he just looks really good, and Cullen feels his fingers twitch with the sudden urge to reach out and touch him.

He doesn’t, but only because a moment later, Dorian begins to stir. When he opens his eyes, he looks straight at him, and something in Cullen’s stomach actually _flutters_.

“Welcome back.” He smiles down at him. “How do you feel?”

“Never better,” Dorian replies groggily. “Though, I don't suppose they’d let me sleep longer now that you’ve seen me awake.”

Cullen laughs. “I’m your doctor, Dorian. Not your mother, telling you to get up in the morning. You can sleep as long as you like.”

“You're not my doctor,” Dorian mutters, his voice thick with sleep. “You're my husband.”

Cullen flushes scarlet. “Yes, well. That too. I'm your doctor and your husband.”

Dorian grins, long and lazy up at him, and pushes himself up on his elbows so that he's sitting up in bed. “I’m not going to die,” he says after a moment. There’s a note of awe in his voice, as if he still can't quite believe it.

“You're not going to die,” Cullen repeats, smiling.

“So what happens now?” Dorian asks, shifting a little in bed. “If the cancer really is gone, am I free to leave?”

“Not so fast,” Cullen tells him. “Yes, the cancer is gone, but we still need to keep you for the rest of the week, just to be certain that your condition is stable, run some tests, that sort of thing. Other than that, though, you’re nearly done.”

Dorian smiles, satisfied. “That’s probably for the best. I can scarcely imagine what I’d do with myself if they let me go just yet.” He looks up at him, eyes startlingly honest. “I can’t thank you enough for this, you know.”

“Don’t,” Cullen shakes his head. “It was nothing, really.” He clears his throat awkwardly and gets to his feet. “You should get some rest. The nurses will be in with some medicine for you, and I’ll be back to check on you later.”

Dorian nods, and Cullen heads for the door. Lavellan waggles her eyebrows at him suggestively when he leaves the room. Cullen tells her to shut up.

-

He’s in the middle of a surgery one afternoon later in the week when his phone starts ringing. He lets it go to voicemail -- after all, his hands are somewhat occupied -- and it’s only afterward, when he’s alone in his office, that he notices he has a message. It’s from Cassandra.

He calls her back, and she picks up on the second ring. “Cullen,” she says, her voice business as usual, but under the words he can hear her smiling.

“Hey.” He cradles the phone between his shoulder and his ear, shuffling some papers around on his desk. “Sorry that I missed your call, but I was wrist-deep in someone’s kidney. Did you need something?”

“Yes, actually,” she replies. “I’m going to be in town next week for a conference, and I thought it would be alright if I could stay with you for a couple of nights. I take it you still have that awful pull-out couch in the living room?”

“The one you always complain feels like sleeping on a bed of gravel?” He laughs. “I’m afraid I haven’t gotten around to getting rid of it, I’m sorry to say.”

She sighs. “I expected as much. It will have to do.”

There’s a pause, and some shuffling on the other end of the line. Cullen knows Cassandra well enough to guess that although the conference might be a week away, she’s probably packing her bags as they speak.

“So,” she says a few moments later, “how are you doing? Are you seeing anyone?”

He very nearly chokes on his own tongue. “That, um. Well. Define ‘seeing’.”

Another pause. “And just what is that supposed to mean?” she asks him, her tone equal parts suspicion and absolute bewilderment.

“I may have gotten married,” he tells her, the confession followed by an almost immediate cringe.

“Married? What on _earth_ , Cullen--”

“It’s nothing!” He stops her before she has the chance to ask him anything else, dragging a hand down his face in frustration. It’s been less than two weeks, and he’s already fed up with having to explain himself to everyone. “He’s a patient of mine. He had cancer, and didn’t have insurance, so I did it to save his life. It’s nothing, I promise.”

“Nothing?” The surprise has gone out of her voice, only to be replaced with a terrible concern. “You married a patient, Cullen -- you broke the rules. This man, whoever he may be, is not a stranger to you anymore. You saved his life. How can that be nothing?”

“I’m handling it,” he says. “It’s already done. I can’t change it.”

The thing is, he keeps telling himself and everyone around him that he’s fine, that he’s got everything under control, but when it comes right down to it, he’s not so sure. It’s not something that’s obvious to everyone who meets him, but Cullen has problems, and it’s not only because he’s a thirty-two year old man who still has little to no sense of direction in his life.

It’s because over and over again, Cullen is someone who’s been left behind. He’s not the same as people like Lavellan or Dorian or even Josephine -- he’s a quiet man, reserved where others are vibrant and loud and colorful. Cullen is content to live in solitude, and to be honest, there’s never been anyone who has quite taken the time to figure him out.

Cassandra cares about him; she’s one of the only people who ever truly has. He’s known her for what seems like forever, and she’s one of his oldest and truest friends. Even Lavellan, even Josephine -- they’ve never said so, but he knows.

But there’s never been anyone else, and Cassandra knows that.

“I’d love to meet him,” she says at last, and her voice is softer than before. “If you both have some time, that is.”

Cullen smiles a little, feeling as though a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. “Now, that,” he tells her, “I can definitely manage.”

-

Dorian is sitting up in bed when Cullen walks into the room the following afternoon, sunlight streaming through the open blinds to cast a halo of light onto the bed, where a book lies propped open in his lap. He looks better today, more color in his cheeks and fully conscious.

“Are you here to discharge me?” Dorian looks up at him, smiling.

“Later today, if all goes well,” Cullen says, taking a seat in the chair closest to the bed. “I was hoping that I could talk to you about something first.”

Dorian blinks, assumes a more serious expression. “I’m all ears.”

“Right, well.” Cullen frowns, wringing his hands in his lap as he contemplates how best to word what he’s about to say. “A close friend of mine is going to be coming to town next weekend, and she’s going to be staying with me for a few days. I told her about us, and it turns out that she wants to meet you.”

There’s a slight pause, and his eyes shift to Dorian’s face. He appears to be considering.

“Alright,” he replies after a moment. “What’s the problem, then?”

“I,” Cullen starts, then stops. “Is that . . . would that be something you would want? It would probably involve a lot of questioning, and she _is_ a radiologist. I’m half-convinced that she can actually see through people, at this point.”

Dorian laughs. “That sounds like a challenge. Though I’ve no doubt that with the tumor gone, I’ll be feeling perfectly up to it.”

Cullen smiles at him. “Thank you.” He can already feel some of the tension starting to leave his body. “Well, once the papers are signed, you’ll be free to leave. How would you feel about dinner tonight? My treat.”

“That sounds good,” Dorian says agreeably. “What time do you get off?”

“I'm not sure. Nine, maybe?”

“So much for dinner,” Dorian snorts. “That sounds more like a late-night snack.”

“Well, I could have an actual dinner if you were prepared to eat cafeteria food again.”

Dorian wrinkles his nose. “I’ll wait. I think I’ve had enough for one lifetime.”

“Good choice,” Cullen replies. He stands up, rolls his shoulders once to let out the cracks, and doesn’t miss the way Dorian watches him. “I’ll be back for you later, then?”

Dorian grins. “I’ll be waiting.”

Cullen leaves the room a few moments later, feeling almost as if were it not for the ceiling, he could fly.

-

“It’s good to see you taking advantage of that spare key, you know,” Dorian comments one day when Cullen lets himself in, not bothering to look up from his book as he sits on the couch, reading. “It adds an element of realism to the whole situation, which I find quite refreshing.”

“What, signing the papers wasn’t enough for you?” Cullen asks wryly, shutting the door behind him. “I can knock next time, if you’d prefer.”

“What? No, don’t bother. I don’t mind.” Dorian eyes him more closely. “Are you alright?”

Cullen looks back at him, jacket hanging half-off of his frame, and sighs. His shoulders sag as he exhales all of the air from his lungs. He closes his eyes. “I’m fine. It’s been a long day, that’s all.”

Dorian glances at the spot next to him on the couch. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I. . .” he trails off, unsure. Dorian puts his book down, looking genuinely concerned now. Almost as if of their own accord, Cullen feels his legs moving, and he crosses the room to sit down beside him.

“A patient woke up in the middle of a surgery today.” He’s talking before he knows it, the words tumbling from his mouth faster than he can stop them. “It turns out that she had an abnormally high resistance to our anesthesia, and her husband was beside himself afterwards, and he wanted to sue the hospital. We had several traumas, and we lost two of them, and a friend of mine had a heart transplant surgery that failed. He didn’t make it.”

This, he knows, is the hardest part about being a doctor. He tries his hardest to save everyone, but in the end, he knows that he can’t. No doctor is a god, no matter how much most of them think that they are, and it’s just terribly discouraging, to know that no matter what you do, you’ll never be able to save enough lives.

He feels Dorian’s hand on his shoulder, and he doesn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I can’t imagine how difficult that must have been.”

“It’s fine.” Cullen shakes his head, rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand. “It’s just part of the job -- there are good days and bad ones. I shouldn’t let them get to me like this.”

He falls silent then, lost in thought. Dorian still hasn’t removed his hand from where it rests on his shoulder blade, tracing small circles over the fabric of his T-shirt. It’s nice.

“Anyway,” he says eventually, “Cassandra’s plane is going to be getting in at four o’clock on Friday. I’ll be picking her up at the airport, and then the three of us can go out for dinner after.”

Dorian nods. “Alright.”

“You have to be prepared for her not to like you,” Cullen warns him. “It’s nothing personal -- I’ve known her since med school, and she’s just sort of protective of me. That, and I’m fairly sure that she could take you in a fight.”

“I think I’m more afraid of your friend than I am of that tumor,” Dorian says.

“You should be.” They share a laugh, and Cullen glances at his watch. “I should go. Today’s my only day off this week, and I have things to do. I’ll pick you up on Friday . . . three o’clock, let’s say?”

Dorian smiles. “I’ll see you then.”

Cullen makes his way to the door, pulling on his jacket. “Enjoy the rest of your day, darling,” he tells him as he’s leaving.

“Be safe,” he hears Dorian call out as the door shuts behind him. There’s only the barest hint of sarcasm in the words. Cullen takes this as a step in the right direction.

-

He pulls up outside Dorian’s apartment on Friday afternoon, already feeling slightly nervous, five minutes ahead of schedule. Dorian is waiting for him outside on the steps, looking even neater than usual as he walks up to the car, opens the passenger’s side door, and climbs in.

When Cullen tells him so, he laughs. “It’s for her benefit, really,” he says. “To prove to her that I’m not some sort of scoundrel.”

“Are you actually worried?” Cullen asks him as they pull back onto the road and head for the airport. Dorian shifts in his seat a little, not quite meeting his eyes, and Cullen feels the same familiar tug again, stronger than before. “You don’t need to be. I’ll be with you the entire time.”

Dorian grins wryly. “Are you saying that you’re prepared to shield me with your body, should things go awry and she starts aiming the cutlery at my head?”

Cullen glances at him. “Is that something that happens to you often?”

“You’d be surprised.” His smile wavers. “Friends, parents, dogs, young children -- the list of those who find my existence personally offensive is a surprisingly long one.”

Cullen frowns, and wonders how that could possibly be. “That’s awful,” he says.

Dorian waves his hand dismissively, makes a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat. “It doesn’t matter. I enjoy the pariah aspect of my personality; I rather think that it suits me. Don’t you?”

No, Cullen almost wants to tell him -- he doesn’t understand how someone like Dorian could be disliked by anyone, when he’s the one person Cullen finds himself wanting to spend more time with, wanting to know more about.

“Cassandra isn’t like that,” he says instead. “At least, she won’t attack you unless provoked.” He smiles a bit. “She wants what’s best for me, that’s all. I’ve been in bad relationships before, and it’s hard for her to watch me go through that. Er, not that we actually _are_ in a relationship, that is,” he hastens to add.

“Bad relationships?” Dorian frowns, ignoring his last words. “What do you mean?”

‘It’s nothing,” Cullen mutters, embarrassed. “Well, not nothing, but it doesn’t matter anymore. Cassandra calls it emotional abuse -- she says I was being taken advantage of. Lying, cheating, that sort of situation. I don’t know what to think.”

“Why not?” Dorian asks.

Cullen shrugs. “It’s complicated. It wasn’t as if I didn’t have a choice. I could have left at any time, but I didn’t. I’m as much at fault for what happened as they were, even if we didn’t share the same roles in it.”

“Rubbish,” Dorian says, an edge to his voice, and when Cullen looks at him, his expression is more intense than he’s ever seen it. “You can’t blame yourself for being mistreated. Those people are fools.”

They’re pulling into the airport now -- Cullen’s fingers are tight on the steering wheel as he circles the lot, looking for a place to park. He finds a space not far from the entrance, shifts the car into park, and feels Dorian’s eyes on him.

Cullen swallows hard. His mouth is dry. He thinks he finally knows what it feels like to be Lavellan when he asks, “Does that make you sad?”

“It makes me angry,” Dorian says, without an ounce of hesitation. “You deserve better.”

Cullen looks at him then, and feels his heart fogging up. “It doesn’t matter,” he says. “It was a long time ago. And as far as Cassandra’s concerned, she just doesn’t want to have to worry about me anymore. I don’t want her to worry about me.”

Dorian nods slowly. “Then I’ll make sure she doesn’t have to.”

“What do you mean?”

He figures out what Dorian’s going to do a split second before he does it, watches as he leans in, braces one hand on the back of his neck and the other against his jawline, and kisses him, a soft press of his lips that has Cullen’s heartbeat running a marathon into another galaxy.

It’s over too quickly, and when he pulls back to look at him, there’s something in his eyes that Cullen can’t quite place.

“Don’t worry,” he tells him, “I can be very convincing.”

-

Surprisingly, the atmosphere at dinner isn’t nearly as tense as he thought it would be.

They end up eating at a little hole-in-the-wall Italian restaurant downtown -- incidentally, the same one Dorian mentioned to him weeks ago, when they first met. Cassandra seems happy, talking animatedly about her job and the upcoming conference she’ll be attending, and Cullen is content to listen to her, sneaking a glance at Dorian every so often to make sure he’s doing alright.

In truth, Dorian is a natural, smiling pleasantly and making conversation with her in the same effortless way he seems to do everything else. He asks her questions about her work and how she and Cullen met, laughing at her stories about their days spent in med school together.

She wants not to like him, Cullen knows. At the very least, she wants to keep her guard up. But after two hours and three glasses of wine, she’s relaxed considerably, leaning back in her chair, face flushed red from laughter.

“So, Dorian,” she asks him later in the evening, as they’re waiting for the server to return with their bill, “what do you do for a living?”

The question is innocent enough, but Cullen grimaces at it all the same. He should have known that she wouldn’t be able to resist getting in a short interrogation. He wills Dorian not to say anything that might upset her, but braces himself for the worst.

If the question makes Dorian nervous, he doesn’t show it. “I used to teach at the local university,” he says easily. “I was laid off in January. The college has been in a bad situation financially for a few years now, so it didn’t really come as a surprise.”

Cassandra nods. “I see.”

“I’ve started looking for a position elsewhere, now that I’m well again,” Dorian continues, “but so far the only options I’ve considered are out of state, and, well. I’d like to stay in this general area if I can help it.”

“So you’ve already had the surgery, then?” she asks, surprised.

It’s Dorian’s turn to nod. “Almost two weeks ago, now.”

“And you two are still. . .?” she trails off, looking to Cullen for an explanation.

“Only for a little while,” he says hastily, casting a furtive glance at Dorian, but the other man’s face is unreadable. “Just long enough so as not to raise suspicions. There aren’t many people at work who know about us in the first place, but we can’t be too careful, you know.”

“Ah.” She turns back to Dorian. “So this really was just about the surgery, then. You two aren’t a couple.”

Cullen holds his breath. He closes his eyes, and when he does, the image of Dorian’s face inches away from his comes unbidden into his mind, along with the memory of another pair of lips, warm and slightly chapped against his, the feeling of a light stubble grazing his chin.

He opens his eyes, and glances at Dorian, who looks, if possible, even more uncomfortable than Cullen feels. “It was his idea,” he replies unhelpfully. “I was . . . coerced.”

Cassandra frowns. “So I take it you’ll be getting a divorce once this is all over?”

“We haven’t really talked about it yet,” Cullen says, coming to his rescue. “Once everything settles down a bit, then maybe--”

“Dorian,” Cassandra interrupts, folding her hands together on top of the table. Oh, no. Here it comes. “I have no doubt that Cullen means well by helping you, but I’m just a little doubtful about what your intentions are with him. I mean, this _is_ Cullen we’re talking about -- he’s known for being generous, and I’m concerned that he’s being taken advantage of.”

Dorian opens his mouth as if to say something, but seems to think better of it. His hand is lying on the tabletop, closing and opening as if trying to grab hold of something just out of reach.

“I just think it seems very convenient for you that the two of you stay married,” she continues, “especially with Cullen being who he is. I’ve seen him used and manipulated in the past, and I won’t allow it to happen again.”

Cullen looks at her, a lump rising in his throat. He remembers the day he met her, when he walked in on her having an argument with his roommate, who she was dating at the time, yelling at the top of her lungs. The same ferocity that was in her voice is in her expression now, and he realizes with a start how much she cares for him. How much she always has.

He hears Dorian take a deep breath, watches as he straightens up in his chair and looks her squarely in the eye before speaking. “Cassandra,” he says, “I’m aware of how this all looks. I wasn’t prepared for any of it -- I never wanted to force anyone to take responsibility for me the way that Cullen has.”

Cullen feels his heart stutter and then stop. “He was there for me when I was going through something terrible. When there was no one else left to offer me help. He saved me.”

Cassandra folds her arms across her chest, staring at him intently. Cullen’s mouth is hanging open, speechless. _I can be very convincing_ , he hears Dorian say in the back of his mind.

“I don’t know what’s going to come of any of this,” Dorian says to her now. “All I know is that it’s a good thing that we _are_ married, because I’m going to need that time. I’m going to need a lifetime to repay him for everything he’s done for me.”

The silence that follows his words is deafening, but Cullen finds himself wanting to reach over the top of the table and take Dorian’s hand. He doesn’t know if any of the words he’s said are true, but he’s never heard anyone sound so genuine while saying anything in all his life.

After several moments’ pause, Cassandra speaks. “Fine,” she tells him, as though she doesn’t quite know what to make of the things he’s said. “I’ll be waiting for your results.”

The conversation begins to flow more easily after that, and for the rest of the night, whenever Cullen looks at Dorian, he feels as though he’s seeing him for the very first time.

-

“What are you smiling about?” Josephine asks him over lunch one day, when she catches him beaming down at his phone screen.

He’s in the hospital’s cafeteria, sitting across from Josephine and Lavellan, who have spent the last twenty minutes discussing open-heart surgery over grilled cheese and tomato soup. He finishes up the text he’s sending to Dorian before sliding his phone back into his pocket.

“Sorry, what?” he asks her.

“Do you need to ask?” Lavellan grins at Josephine around a mouthful of sandwich.

Cullen smiles. “Dorian says he’s going to try and get his old job back,” he says, unable to keep the pride out of his voice. “He has an appointment today at the university he used to work for. I was wishing him good luck.”

“You know,” Lavellan says thoughtfully, “the way you go on about him all the time, people would think that he really is your husband.”

“That's probably because he really _is_ my husband.”

She rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Cullen shrugs. He hasn’t actually seen Dorian for a couple of weeks now, but they keep up through texts and phone calls. Cullen’s busy enough these days, and Dorian’s been searching for work, so it’s not something that he chooses to dwell on.

“We’re going out for dinner tonight, though,” he tells them. “Just to catch up, that sort of thing.”

“You’re going on a date!” Josephine exclaims, clapping her hands together. “How romantic.”

“It’s not like that,” he says, embarrassed. “We’re just keeping in touch for practical reasons. It’s good to know that he’s doing alright now that the tumor is gone.” His phone vibrates in his pocket, and he checks it quickly. “I’ve got to go. Guess who gets to watch Leliana peel someone’s face off and put an entirely new one on?”

“Really?” Josephine’s eyes widen in surprise. Leliana’s the head of the plastic surgeons and, incidentally, the woman on whom it’s common knowledge that Josephine has something of a crush. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“There was only room for one more surgeon,” Cullen says, feigning innocence as he stands up to leave. “And of course, I know how busy you are. I’m afraid it completely slipped my mind.”

Lavellan laughs as Josephine stares at him, a wounded expression on her face. “You know, not everyone can be happily married!” she calls after him.

Cullen grins back at them and waves as he heads for the operating room.

-

“Have you ever seen anyone with their face peeled off?” Cullen asks Dorian later that evening over dinner, ignoring the look of blatant distaste he throws at him. “It’s amazing -- everything was intact, but the top layer was just gone. You can’t imagine how fascinating it was.”

“You’re right.” Dorian puts his fork down, looking a little green. “I can’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Cullen says, frowning. “Did I make you sick?”

“You would make most people,” Dorian replies defensively, taking a sip of wine.

He pushes his plate away for emphasis, and Cullen bites down on the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing. The lights in the restaurant are dim, but he can see the way Dorian’s eyes crinkle up at the corners over the rim of his glass, and knows that he hasn’t truly upset him.

“So,” Dorian says a moment later, “apart from the excitement of redecorating facial anatomy, how is work?”

Cullen shrugs. “Just more of the usual. It’s been a busy week -- lots of transplants, a few amputees. Oh, and yesterday we had a four-year-old who’d swallowed some magnets. We had to operate immediately, but he made it in the end.”

Dorian makes a face, and this time Cullen does laugh. “Tell me how the interview went today,” he says, changing the subject. “Do you think you’ll get your job back?”

Dorian shrugs and looks away, trying to look nonchalant, but Cullen can see something almost like hope flickering in his expression. “It’s too early to tell,” he says. “They told me that they would let me know by the end of the week. I think it went well, though.”

“That’s good,” Cullen tells him, smiling. “I’m happy for you.”

“I haven’t even got the job yet,” Dorian says indignantly.

“You will,” Cullen insists. He doesn’t know why, but he’s got a good feeling about this. Dorian has been through so much to get to where he is, and now that the worst is finally over, Cullen is sure that the rest of the pieces will begin to fall into place.

It hardly feels like it, but it’s already been more than a month since the surgery. Really, the two of them shouldn’t be seeing each other so often anymore, and at the very least, they should have divorced by now. But they’ve never discussed it seriously, and so it hasn’t happened.

Of course, it all makes sense in Cullen’s mind -- after all, Dorian is the person whose life he saved, and as strange as it seems, he’s not quite ready to let that go. He’s come to see the other man as someone irreplaceable, special, someone almost like a friend but who falls just short. Dorian is different than anyone he’s ever met before, accepting him without hesitation into his life without asking for anything in return. He finds that when he’s with him, he can breathe.

(He wakes up in the dead of night sometimes, one hand pressed to his mouth, remembering what it was like to kiss him. He lies there in the dark, head full of him, _wanting_ , and wondering what it would be like to do it again.)

They haven’t talked about it since it happened. That’s another thing that he understands, knows that he shouldn’t expect any different. But they’re sitting across from one another in a dimly lit restaurant, and maybe Cullen’s had one too many glasses of wine, but he wants to try.

“Do you--” he starts to say, but he’s cut off by the sound of Dorian’s phone ringing.

Dorian looks at him apologetically as he reaches into his pocket and pulls it out, glancing at the screen. Almost immediately, his entire expression changes, his face going somehow blank, as though a switch has been flipped and he’s shut himself off. It’s disconcerting.

“Dorian?” he asks. His mouth is dry. “Is everything alright?”

“It’s my father,” he replies, almost mechanically. He stares at the screen for a second longer before turning it off and slipping it back into his pocket.

Cullen feels cold. “Why would your father be calling you?” he asks. “You told me you hadn’t spoken with your family in years.”

“I haven’t.” Dorian’s mouth twists into a wry smile. It’s anything but humorous. He takes another sip of wine that sounds more like a gulp. “I assure you, I don’t have the faintest idea what that was about.”

His tone is light, but the hand that’s holding the glass is shaking, and he won’t look up to meet his eyes. There are shadows in his face that weren’t there minutes ago, and they make him look haunted and hunted in a way that Cullen has never seen.

“You haven’t told me what happened,” he says quietly. He knows that he shouldn’t ask, that he should leave it be, but he can’t stop the words from leaving him. “With your family, I mean.”

Dorian shuts his eyes. “There’s nothing much to talk about.”

Cullen is silent. Dorian looks as if he’s having difficulty just sitting there, eyes shut tight and shoulders rigid, and Cullen wishes that it would all go away. He doesn’t want to force the issue, though, so he presses his lips together, holds his breath, and waits.

After what seems like a lifetime, Dorian speaks.

“My parents disowned me when I was in grad school,” he says, and then pauses, as if every word out of his mouth is causing him physical pain. “When I came out of the closet. I was an only child, you see. All of their hopes and dreams for the future were resting on my shoulders, and I let them down. I had a row with my father. It ended badly, and I left.”

He avoids Cullen’s eyes. “After that, I moved in with a friend. His name was Felix -- we were very close. For a while, everything was fine, but then one day, he was in a car accident. The other driver was drunk, ran a red light. He was going sixty miles an hour when he hit him.”

Everything is still. “Of course, neither of us had health insurance. We were young, we were students -- you can imagine. I got to the hospital as fast as I could, but he was already in surgery. The doctors told me that there was no time to lose. I knew that the medical bills would be astronomical, so I called my parents to ask for help. I rang them a dozen times, and no one answered.”

Cullen listens, heart hammering in his throat. Dorian says the words slowly, as if it’s his first time telling someone this, and Cullen thinks that it might be. For some reason, that makes him unbearably sad.

“I don’t know why I left. I suppose I was terribly angry.” He pauses. “I wasn’t even halfway to their house when I got a call from the hospital. I don’t even remember what exactly he died of. Isn’t that horrible? All I can recall is that I couldn’t even bring myself to hate the doctor, because she was _crying_ when she told me. She was in tears, as if Felix was her friend and not mine.”

He looks up, eyes wide open and searching. “What do you do when you have no one to blame?”

Cullen is usually good at handling questions like these -- he’s a doctor, so of course he has to be -- but for some reason, he looks at Dorian and knows that words won’t be enough. He reaches across the table and takes Dorian’s hand, threads their fingers together.

“Let’s go,” he says. Dorian only nods.

He waits until they’re in the parking lot, all alone but for the usual noises of the city at night, before pressing Dorian against the car and kissing him as tenderly as he can manage. Dorian closes his eyes, presses himself closer, clinging tightly to the front of Cullen’s shirt as though it’s his lifeline. He’s different than he was the first time, no longer taking the lead.

This time, Cullen pulls away first. “Where are we going?” Dorian asks him when he does.

“Home,” Cullen says.

It’s silent in the car on the way back to Dorian’s apartment. Cullen is lost in thought, but he can feel Dorian watching him, and it twists deep in his stomach again, the same ache, that familiar, ever-present want. There’s static crackling in the air between them, dangerous and electric, and he knows that something has changed between the two of them. They won’t be able to come back from this the same as they were before.

He drives just a little faster than usual to get there. Dorian gets out of the car before Cullen even turns off the engine, and when they’re on the doorstep, Cullen fumbling with the keys in the dark, Dorian is right behind him, pressing hot, hard kisses against his neck.

The door opens and they stumble inside, and the moment it closes behind them Dorian is there, pushing him against it, sliding his fingers into his hair. Cullen braces his hands against his hips and Dorian kisses him like he means it, a long, languid slide of his tongue that leaves Cullen flushed and breathless. Dorian’s fingers scratch at the back of his neck, and Cullen sighs against his lips.

“Take me to bed,” Dorian breathes raggedly when they break apart. “Now.”

He doesn’t know how they manage to make it to the bedroom in the dark without stumbling over something, but suddenly he feels the back of his knees hitting the edge of the bed, and Dorian is pushing him down onto the mattress. Cullen edges backward until he’s lying back against the pillows, and Dorian follows, crawling up his body and straddling him.

Then they’re kissing again, harder than before, Cullen straining upward to meet him, their teeth almost clacking together with the intensity of it. Dorian pulls back to bite at his lower lip, then lower, trailing wet, open-mouthed kisses down the expanse of his throat. He can feel Dorian’s hands on him, blunt nails scratching at the skin of his throat, shoulders, anywhere they can reach. Cullen’s hands are still gripping at his waist, the skin of his torso where his shirt has ridden up hot against his fingers.

“Dorian,” he gasps, arching off the bed as Dorian bites at the juncture between his shoulder and the base of his neck. He’s only half-hard, but he’s sure that judging by the way things are going, it won’t be much longer.

Dorian pays him no attention, focusing instead on undoing the buttons of his shirt, trailing a hand down the taut muscles of his abdomen. Cullen’s hips twitch involuntarily. Dorian’s hands still their movement, and he gives an experimental roll of his hips that has Cullen seeing stars.

Outside the window, the moon is coming out from behind the clouds, and light streams into the room, collecting in pools on the floor, the walls, the bed. Cullen looks up at Dorian, and they’re inches from one another but he feels a thousand miles away.

“Dorian,” Cullen says again, differently this time. “Dorian.”

Dorian finally meets his eyes, and he looks strange and sad and heart-stoppingly beautiful. Cullen shifts so that he’s sitting up and Dorian slides off of him, and when he lifts a hand to touch his face, he feels the other man flinch. He freezes, his throat closing up.

“What?” Dorian asks, his voice broken. “Don’t . . . don’t you want me?”

It’s such a ridiculous question that Cullen has to laugh. “Yes.”

“Then why?” Dorian leans over to kiss him again, but Cullen stops him, holding him back with one hand pressed against his chest. Dorian frowns, struggling against him. “Just take it, damn it, it’s for you--”

Cullen shakes his head. “I can’t.”

_“Why?”_

“Because,” he says, as evenly as he can manage, “I don’t think it’s what you need right now.”

He starts to stand up, but he feels Dorian’s hand close around his wrist, pulling him back down onto the bed. His eyes are wide open, and Cullen is shocked by the emotion in his gaze. “Stay,” he says, voice wavering, as though he’s afraid that Cullen will say no again, as though he thinks he’s capable of such a thing. “Please.”

Cullen feels himself nod. “Alright.”

He kicks off his shoes, pulls his phone and his wallet and his car keys out of his pockets before joining Dorian, who’s already under the covers. His whole body is shaking, and Cullen pulls him in close, wrapping his arms around him and tucking his head under his chin.

“Go to sleep,” he murmurs against his hair.

He stops shivering a few minutes later, and Cullen feels him go limp in his arms when he finally falls asleep. Outside the window, the moon is still bright, and Cullen looks down at him and tries to count his eyelashes before a wave of exhaustion passes over him and he follows suit.

He wakes up just before the dawn, and, careful not to wake Dorian, he slips out of bed, puts on his shoes, and goes home.

-

He wants to say that things go back to normal after that.

Or at least, whatever normal meant before Dorian, before he took that chart out of Josephine’s hands and walked straight into another life without knowing what he was getting himself into. That normal.

Days pass without a word, without so much as a text message, and it’s exactly what Cullen was expecting, so he isn’t hurt, really. He throws himself back into his work, nine to five and extra hours tacked onto the end so that he doesn’t have to go home and remember what it was like when he left, how it felt to look back and see everything he’s ever wanted and still walk away.

Lavellan notices before Josephine does. She walks into his office one afternoon to ask him why he’s been so damn standoffish lately, but before he can even get the words out, she knows. She listens to him tell the story anyway, in short sentences using words with less than three syllables.

“Do you love him?” she asks.

He doesn’t answer her -- because what is there to say, really -- but he thinks that she knows the answer to that, too. She leaves his office a few minutes later with a pat on the back. “You know where to find me,” she says.

He’s doing fine, though, really. He did what he meant to do, and now they can both move on, and Dorian can live the long, full life that he deserves. At the end of it all, Cullen only hopes that he’s happy. Maybe someday he’ll run into him on the street somewhere, and it won’t hurt quite so much as it does now.

Lavellan’s already learned how to live without regrets. Someday, Cullen is going to figure out the secret.

-

He comes home early in the evening a week later to find Dorian waiting for him, sitting on the couch in his living room with his head down. He’s so shocked to see him at first that he almost drops his keys. Dorian looks up at the sound of the door opening, and when their eyes meet, Cullen feels his heart skip a beat.

“Hello,” he says, his voice soft and warm, smiling a little. “I’ve been thinking that we should talk.”

There’s afternoon light coming in through the blinds, bright oranges and golds that play across his cheekbones, and he looks so beautiful that Cullen can’t be sure if he’s real. He wants to close his eyes, pinch himself to make sure that he isn’t dreaming, but Dorian is watching him, and he doesn’t have the time.

“Alright,” Cullen says when he finds his voice.

He shrugs his way out of his jacket before making his way over to where Dorian is sitting, taking a seat in the chair opposite him. He regards him cautiously, distantly aware of the fact that this is the first time that Dorian has ever actually been inside his house. Leaning forward in his chair, elbows resting on his knees, he braces himself, and waits.

“I spoke with my father,” Dorian says a moment later, which is pretty much the last thing Cullen expects.

“Oh.” He blinks at him in surprise. “How did that go?”

“Better than I thought it would.” Dorian looks down at his hands, fingers clasped tightly together, as though he needs something to occupy them. “He and my mother have apparently been talking for a while now -- they both want me to come home.”

“Ah.” So that’s why he’s here, to say goodbye. Cullen ignores the stab of hurt that wedges itself in between the cracks in his ribs, tries to rearrange his face into something that could pass for a smile.

“It’s been so many years,” Dorian continues. “I’d never expected to see them again, but my mother’s become sentimental in her age, and my father is retired now. I think that they want to try to have a relationship with me, while there’s still time. I’ll be leaving at the end of next week.”

Cullen looks up, startled. “So soon?” he asks.

Dorian nods. “Yes,” he says, and then: “I was . . . I was hoping that you would come with me.”

“What?” Cullen stares at him, realizing, his heart in his mouth. “But I -- so you’re -- you’re not going to leave for good, then? You’re going to stay here?”

“Of course I’m staying here.” Dorian frowns. “I got a call from the university last week -- they’re going to hire me again, in the fall. I got the job.”

Cullen exhales shakily, feeling just a little lightheaded. “So you want me to go with you, to meet your parents. You got your job back, and you’re sitting right in front of me in my living room, and I’m not having a stroke. Am I missing something?”

“No, that summarizes it all quite nicely,” Dorian says, and sighs. “I should explain -- I meant to come here sooner, but I needed to clear my head. I can understand if you don’t want to see my face after this -- I’ll say what I came to say, and if after I’m done you tell me to get out of your life, I will. You’ll never see me again.”

For some reason, he looks as if the idea makes him terribly sad. Cullen swallows hard. “Go on,” he says. “I’m listening.”

“Right, well, then.” Dorian stands abruptly, running a hand through his hair, ruffling what’s already ruffled, as he begins to pace around the room. “I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry for everything that happened before. The last time we saw each other, I mean. I shouldn’t have let things get so out of hand. It was wrong.”

Cullen frowns. “It’s not your fault. I’m as much to blame for what happened as you are.”

“How can you say that?” Dorian looks wretched. “I practically forced myself on you--”

“No,” Cullen interrupts, “you didn’t. I wanted it to happen. I should have stopped it sooner, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t trying to stop you in the first place, so much as I was trying to stop myself.”

Dorian stops his pacing and looks straight at him, and something in his expression wavers. “It wasn’t ever about that,” he says quietly. “For me, at least, it was never just about sex. You’re worth more than that. I wanted us to be more than that.”

He watches as Cullen gets to his feet, crosses the room in three long strides until he’s standing directly in front of him, their faces inches apart. Cullen lifts a hand to cup his cheek, fingers tracing over the skin of his jaw, and this time Dorian doesn’t flinch, doesn’t pull away.

“I think I’ve wanted that, too,” he says, his breath catching in his throat, an instant before he pulls Dorian in and kisses him.

It’s a moment before Dorian responds to it, but Cullen can feel it when he does, leaning forward on his toes, hands pressed against his chest, kissing him back in earnest. They go slowly this time, tentative, exploring, and when Cullen finally gathers him in his arms, Dorian’s entire body seems to sag with relief.

“How could you think,” Cullen breathes against his lips, “that I didn’t want you? How dense could you possibly be?”

Dorian laughs, looking dizzy with happiness, and smiles up at him. “I don’t know. I thought that perhaps you were only doing it for my sake. That you were trying to save me from something.”

“I’ve already done that,” Cullen reminds him, and kisses him again.

It should be terrifying, the way his heart constricts when he feels Dorian take his hands, pulling him in what he can only assume is the general direction of his bedroom, but instead he only laughs softly against his mouth, feeling a lightness inside him for which he has no name, as if he’s finally found something worth holding onto. It’s not the same as it was the last time they were in this position -- they go slow, unhurried, with a new sureness to contrast their earlier uncertainty.

His room is just as it was when he left it this morning, bed unmade and clothes strewn all over the floor, but Dorian doesn’t seem to mind as he kisses his neck, hooking a finger through his belt loops to pull him closer, until Cullen’s body is pressed flush against his. He stumbles forward and then they’re sprawling onto the bed in a tangle of arms and legs, and he feels Dorian’s smile pressed against his throat.

He finally remembers that he has hands, skims his fingers up his waist to the hem of his shirt, pulls it up and over his head. Dorian obliges, and it falls somewhere onto the floor. He pauses to kick off his shoes, and Cullen is quick to follow.

The smile is still there when he finds the buttons on Cullen’s own shirt and begins to work at them, and Cullen sees his eyes darken when he finally pulls it off of him, his expression sliding away into something else. Cullen tenses up when he kisses him this time, tongue sliding against his lips and into his mouth, feeling as though he needs to brace himself for the way Dorian trails a hand down his body before setting to work undoing the buttons on his jeans.

He’s still not prepared when Dorian reaches into his underwear, wraps his hand around his cock and strokes once, twice, three times, until Cullen is hard and gasping for breath under him. With the other hand, he tugs down on the waistband of his jeans. They pool around Cullen’s knees, and when Dorian meets his eyes, he’s looking at him as if he’s never wanted something so much in his entire life.

Dorian takes him into his mouth like he was made for it, licking at the head before hollowing his cheeks out and taking him in deeper. His mouth is so hot and wet that Cullen makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat, clapping a hand to his mouth to stop himself from crying out. His other hand is hovering in the air over the bed, grasping -- he settles for tangling it in Dorian’s hair, and holds on.

It’s the best sort of torture, the feeling of Dorian’s tongue sliding down the length of him, hands clutching his hips to keep him from thrusting off the bed. The hand in his hair is frozen, torn between pushing him down farther and pulling him away.

He wants to last, but the noises Dorian is making as he works at him are driving him half-mad with want. Cullen closes his eyes, grits his teeth as the pressure builds in his stomach, and when he feels the head of his cock hit the back of Dorian’s throat, he all but forgets his own name.

He comes without warning, spilling hot and messy into his mouth with a moan that’s muffled by the palm of his hand. His eyes are shut tight, white behind his lids, his whole body shuddering.

Dorian swallows around him before pulling off, and then Cullen is dragging him back up his body, kissing him fiercely, like he’s starving for it. The other man looks a mess, hair disheveled and face flushed with effort, clinging to his shoulders, and the sight of him has Cullen wrecked. Dorian whimpers into the kiss, a sound that becomes a loud moan when Cullen reaches down into his trousers to curl his fingers around his cock.

It’s something beautiful, watching Dorian come unraveled right before his eyes, gasping and writhing and whispering his name softly, almost reverent, like it’s a prayer on his lips. He’s long and lean and perfect, all dark hair and dark eyes and tanned skin. He bites down on Cullen’s shoulder with a strangled noise when he comes, and, not for the first time since knowing him, Cullen is swept away.

After, when everything has gone silent and still, and the only noise in the room is the sound of their shared breathing, he cranes his neck down to look at Dorian. His eyes are closed, head buried in the crook of his neck, and Cullen feels an inexplicable urge to reach for his hand.

He does it. Dorian’s eyes flutter open, soft and warm and full of promise. “Did you want something else?” he asks, voice teasing.

Cullen shakes his head. “No,” he says. “There’s nothing else. And I definitely do _not_ want you to get out of my life.”

“Never,” Dorian says seriously, and Cullen’s breath catches in his throat. Dorian squeezes his fingers, warm and safe and reassuring, and in that moment, Cullen knows. They won’t be able to come back from this the same as they were before -- at this point, he doubts that even death could separate them. “I’m not going anywhere, not without you.”

“Well, then,” he says, smiling a little. “By all means, take me away.”

-

There are always going to be moments when you’re positive that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be.

Cullen wakes up in the middle of the night to the sound of his cell phone ringing. He sits up a little, blinking and disoriented, and glances at it from where it’s resting on the bedside table. He checks the caller ID before picking up -- it’s Lavellan.

“Hello?” he says into the receiver.

“Cullen?” comes her reply. “Listen, you’re not going to _believe_ what just happened -- Josephine was talking to Leliana after a surgery, and she kissed her! Like, actually kissed her! And I guess they’re together now, and they’re going on a date this Friday--”

“Who is it?” he hears Dorian ask him, voice thick with sleep as he presses his face into the spot between his neck and shoulder. “Someone from work?”

“Oh my _God_ ,” Lavellan says. “Cullen, who was that? Wait a minute, is that _him_? Did you two--”

“Goodnight,” he tells her gently, and he hears her distorted voice shouting at him faintly through the speaker before he hangs up. He switches his phone to silent and puts it back on the bedside table before turning around to face Dorian.

“Is everything alright?” he asks sleepily, draping an arm over him as Cullen pulls the covers up around them both.

“Everything is fine,” Cullen whispers. “Go back to sleep.”

Dorian nods and sighs against him, and within minutes his breathing is low and even again, the steady rise and fall of his shoulders pulling Cullen with him as he falls asleep. Cullen holds him closer, gets comfortable, and closes his eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry for how little of this was actually porn. This was kind of my test run for writing these characters, but I'll probably write of this at some point because like I said, this game ruined me (in the best possible way). Thanks for reading!


End file.
